REVIEW – The curse of the Graphical User Interface (GUI) is that it takes two devices to work in. You need to have a keyboard for input, and a pointing device for moving the insertion point around and selecting/dragging graphical elements about. Originally, that was a keyboard and mouse. The laptop brought it down to being the keyboard and a trackball for a while until some clever soul invented the trackpad. Few companies, however, make this combination in one piece outside of a laptop. The one under consideration here is CZUR, and they sent me a unit to test. Let’s see how it fares.
What is it?
The CZUR Touchboard Pro is a standard Bluetooth keyboard with an integrated trackpad.
What’s in the box?
CZUR Touchboard Pro keyboard and a USB-A <=> USB-C right-angle charging cable.
Specs
From company website
- Wide Compatibility
- Stable Wireless Connection
- Lightweight and Portable
- Rechargeable Battery
- CZUR Protection
Design and features
The CZUR (I call it “cruiser.” I know, there’s only one “R”, but that’s how it looks in my brain.) Touchboard Pro keyboard with trackpad is a standard-sized 13.125″ x 4.25″ x .25″. The base is silvery plastic, while the keys and trackpad are black. It weighs a mere 11.3 oz. The keys are not backlit, which is frustrating, but there is a nice contrast between the black keys and the white lettering.
Setup
Other than standard Bluetooth pairing, no setup is required for the CZUR Touchboard Pro keyboard with trackpad.
Performance
I was able to test this CZUR keyboard with several devices: my iPhone 13 Pro Max, an iPad Pro (12.9) (5th gen.), an iPad mini (6th gen.), and an Android 13 tablet, as well as a Mac mini (M2 Pro) running Sonoma 14.0. It easily pairs with devices and has great battery life. When the OS supports it, the gestures work as expected, for the most part. There were a few times when it balked at zooming gestures in iPadOS. Of course, the trackpad doesn’t work in iOS. (C’mon on, Apple! We’re so ready for trackpad support in iOS that we can taste it!)
What I like
- Lightweight
- Pairs easily
- Good battery life
What I’d change
- Add backlight
- Change the USB-A on the cable to USB-C
Final thoughts
Modern computing requires both a keyboard and a pointing device. Having them in a single unit is quite pleasant. While I was somewhat frustrated with the lack of backlighting, I liked the CZUR Touchboard Pro keyboard with trackpad for use with smaller tablets. It attaches easily via Bluetooth, and both components are either available or not. The price is very low for something that feels solid under your fingers.
Price: $39.00
Where to buy: CZUR and Amazon
Source: The sample of this product was provided by CZUR
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Thank you for the review of the CZUR. As far as iOS support for touchpads, it is not inherent, but I have never had an issue getting a bluetooth touch pad (or bluetooth mouse) to work on my iPhone 12 Pro Max. This “secret” is AssistiveTouch under Accessibility in the settings. I have found that most, if not all functionality is there, including the multi-finger gestures for actions such as Home screen, next screen left or right, etc.. Perhaps you could test with this functionality enabled (I use a triple action button tap to enable/disable the AssistiveTouch [see Accessibility Shortcut]) and let us know if it meets what you were hoping was the expected functionality of the touchpad on the CZUR for the iOS platform.
Thanks again!